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"Shoot, Otto," said Wolfgang, a youth who had taken a liking to the young archer: "the bird is getting further and further." But Otto was busy that moment whittling a willow-twig he had just cut. Max, the second best archer, shot and missed. "Then," said Wolfgang, "I must try myself: a plague on you, young springald, you have lost a noble chance!"
Martha, fanning herself with her handkerchief spread over a bent willow-twig, suddenly passed before him, like an angel in the moonlight. A soft, tender star sparkled in each shaded eye, a faint rose-tint flushed her cheeks, and her lips, slightly parted to inhale the clover-scented air, were touched with a sweet, consenting smile. "Martha!"
The crackle of a foot on a dead willow-twig roused her, and her eyes met St. Vincent's. "You have not congratulated me upon my escape," he began, breezily. "But you must have been dead-tired last night. I know I was. And you had that hard pull on the river besides." He watched her furtively, trying to catch some cue as to her attitude and mood.
He knew that Mr Rowland would have removed his family when the Greys departed, but that the lady had refused to go; and he felt how groundless was her confidence: not that he had pretended to more professional merit than he had believed himself to possess; but that, amidst this disease, he was like a willow-twig in the stream.
They sat there looking, listening, as if they hoped their protest might bring some signal of relenting. No creature, not even a crystal-coated willow-twig, nothing on all the ice-bound earth stirred by as much as a hair; no mark of man past or present broke the grey monotony; no sound but their two voices disturbed the stillness of the world.
These poor creatures were not soldiers, but poor, solitary, and oppressed villagers, that had been sent for rice, of which they carry great loads, by a strap or belt over their heads, in baskets made of the willow-twig. We were directed by our general to let them go, that they might tell our enemies that we were not bloodthirsty murderers.
"I know it's in your blood; and you have only to look down the road to see good examples for you to follow in growing." Now the man thought it was a poplar he had planted. But it was only a quite ordinary willow-twig, which he had taken by mistake, and, as time passed and the cutting grew up, this came to light. "What a monster!" said the keeper. "We must pull this up again."
For the silvery river-trout lying there carried a forked willow-twig between gill and gill-cover. Nor was this all; the fish was fresh-caught, for the gills had not puffed out, nor the supple body stiffened. Every little wavelet rippled its slim and limber length; and a thread of blood trailed from the throat-latch out over the surface of the water.
They were all hard, and fit only for cider yet, but their rich colors beguiled the eye into betrayal of the palate. Joe fixed his choice upon a golden willow-twig.
"Go to," said Rudolf, "thou canst see no limb of him: he is no bigger than a flea." Whiz! his arrow went off. He took up the willow-twig again and began carving a head of Rudolf at the other end, chatting and laughing, and singing a ballad the while.
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